the long-awaited shave of journalist Souley Onohiolo, dubbed operation “drop the beard,” will finally take place after eight months of waiting for a government reshuffle that never came.
The journalist had made a bold bet: he would not shave until President Paul Biya, re-elected on October 12, 2026, changed the cabinet that has been in place since 2019.
“The President of the Organising Committee of the ‘Souley Onohiolo Big Shave’ project informs the national and international press that on Friday, July 3, 2026, at noon, the official ‘Drop the Beard’ ceremony of Souley Onohiolo – Emeritus Journalist, Senior Reporter, and Editorialist – will take place at the Botanik’s Beauty Centre, a service provider located in the Essos neighbourhood of Yaoundé,” the committee’s statement read.
According to the organising committee members, the shaving ceremony for journalist Souley Onohiolo is placed “under the high patronage and general supervision of Dieudonné Mveng Balla, promoter of the TV channel Info TV.”
They describe it as a “singular and unprecedented event that will bring together the cream of Cameroon’s media and the world, around a man whose personal and silent revolt spanned eight months of hair commitment – a forest of beard and untrimmed scalp – to impose itself as a republican struggle.”
In the end, Souley Onohiolo resigned himself to shaving after maintaining his bet for eight months with no government reshuffle in sight. It is thus out of sheer exhaustion that the journalist has decided to part with his hair.
“Better still, a symbol of resistance, a mark of civic engagement, and a firm will to impact society – to move the lines. This is the story that the ceremony of July 3 will close, in the presence of the press and under the eyes of those who followed, from near or far, this singular epic,” the organising committee added.
Souley Onohiolo
